Born of Flame

by Oscar Steven Senn

  “Bones,” Gorsook said. He turned and drew his gun.

  The Keece came quickly, as silently as they had avoided contact, and in a moment the two below were circled, and a dozen mineral spears pointed at Gorsook. He grinned and bolstered his gun.

  “I see,” he said. “Hargh, then! Let’s be off!”

  * * *

  SPACEBREAD did not struggle against the small hands as they carried her, dragged her through the narrow tunnels that honeycombed the hills. She let the darkness condition her eyes until she could make out their shapes. They had come up through hidden passages in the mesa for her, as she had known they would.

  The tunnel broadened and brightened. Lumps of coal burned in recessed wall lamps. Keece children blinked at her, and only from them did she hear speech, shrill, like Geppu’s. But her guards carried her too fast for her to examine the hive-like dwellings they lived in. At last she was thrown on the sand in the center of a wide circular hall, and the Keece crowded in to stare at her as though she were a fallen star.

  In a moment there was a rustle and a sigh through the crowd. Gorsook and Niral landed beside her, roughly. But before they could speak, a new Keece danced forward shaking some sort of rattle. He was adorned, besides his leather tunic, with feathers and colored sand paste. He looked at the aliens with burning eyes.

  “One of your kind, I believe,” Spacebread said to Niral.

  It was a priest or shaman. And it was clear from his behavior that he thought Spacebread and the others were invading viruses.

  Suddenly a great crash sounded, like two rocks being smashed together, and the crowd parted to allow a withered but steady Keece to enter the hall. He was arrayed more finely than the priest, who began jabbering to him, and held a beautiful cluster of crystals in his right hand.

  ‘The king, I’ll wager,” Gorsook growled. “Or whatever acts as king.”

  Spacebread nodded, then stood. She held out her hand in peace. “We mean the Keece no harm,” she said firmly, eyes on the king. “We come only seeking the healing of the blue fountain. We were betrayed in the desert and left to die. I had to reach you some way, for your people are shy. I knew if I disturbed your burial place I would be taken to some authority.”

  The shaman moved to intervene, but the king waved him aside. “You show your good intentions by desecrating the place of our dead?” he said angrily, in a clear, educated voice. “I’m sorry. There can be no question of a visit to the blue fountain. Had you come from the north, as is the custom …”

  Spacebread was about to tell of their betrayal by Geppu when her eyes caught a familiar gleam on the king’s chest. She gasped.

  “Ordinarily I try to be lenient,” the king continued. “But it is our holy month. The other two have done nothing but enter from an unclean direction, but you I’m afraid have broken a vital law. I was educated in Yestupah, but I must uphold the laws of Keece. Your two companions may go, but you will be taken to the Fissure of Kedi and sacrificed in the old way for your crime.”

  The people hissed in pleasure, two guards seized Spacebread, but she shook them off and shouted, “Most Elevated One! I accept your judgement, but let me speak?”

  The king raised his hand in agreement.

  “If you will give my two friends the box from which you got those pieces of wood around your neck, I will give you a great gift.”

  The king touched the brightly polished inlays strung across his chest. “What gift do you offer?”

  “Wood. Thick and heavy, not pale strips like those. Grown in a place with much moisture. Polished and mounted, they would be a treasure worthy of the Keece.”

  “Where do you have such glories hid?” The king quirked his eye plates curiously.

  “Nearby. But first the box—do you have it?” she pleaded.

  “Come,” he gestured. “It also is nearby. On the way to the Fissure.”

  The guards pulled Spacebread along, but she saw the worried look in Gorsook’s eyes and smiled as she passed him. Down a long winding flight of steps they passed and deep into the cavern. On another level they entered a cave beside the stairs and were soon in a sandy place again. They stopped where rows of stones were laid out.

  “We bury the alien dead here,” the king explained. “In the darkness, not in the light like our people. The box with the alien in it is here, under one of these markers. We traded water for the precious wood of the box. Now, where is your wood?”

  Spacebread bowed deeply, and when she stood again she had slipped her Foldover bag off. She reached into it, and a guard pressed his spear to her neck warily. Slowly she fished about in its cool darkness, reaching far deeper than its bottom. She drew out a short stick of firewood and slowly tossed it at the king’s feet.

  The crowd murmured in admiration. The shaman held the wood up for the king to see. “You have more?” the king quickly asked.

  “First the coffer.”

  The priest, at the king’s nod, pointed to a certain stone. Before the guards could move, Gorsook had thrown back the marker and was frantically scooping sand with his good arm. Spacebread knelt beside him to help. Still the guards made no move. They saw an importance in the condemned alien’s actions and glanced nervously at Niral, who chanted softly.

  Spacebread’s nails scraped across metal, and she froze in sudden doubt. The coffer lay like a skeleton, stripped of its handsome inlays. Gorsook pulled it out gently, onto the sand, and looked at her. He breathed deeply, sprang the lock, and lifted the lid. A gasp of frosty air escaped. Klimmit lay pale and secure within the box’s cold heart.

  “It still works!” Gorsook grinned.

  Spacebread released a ragged breath slowly. It had been too close; she had though all was lost, her life in the bargain. Now at least there was a chance, no matter how slim, for Klimmit to live. The tension of the past weeks gripped her suddenly, and she felt tears of relief coming. She touched Klimmit’s face one last time before the lid was closed and she must be led off; it was that touch that brought the tears. Hot and plentiful, they rolled down her face.

  She stood, shoulders trembling, to find the rest of the firewood for the king. But when her eyes were cleared, she saw all of the Keece, frozen, staring at her as if she were a miracle. The shaman dropped to his knees, muttering in astonishment. She tossed the wood at the king’s feet and cast a puzzled glance toward her companions.

  “It is your tears,” Niral whispered. “They have never seen the like.”

  A thousand Keece eyes blinked at her. One of the guards reached out fearfully and touched her wet fur, then looked slack jawed at his hand. Something in the atmosphere had changed.

  “Forgive us,” the king finally said. “We had no idea of your power. You create water from your eyes. Water is power. The people now believe you are a messenger from the gods. Your reasons for desecrating our dead are your own. It will be said it was a judgement. I accept the wood in gratitude—it will adorn the royal pedestal. Do you still wish to visit the fountain?”

  Spacebread glanced at Gorsook, who was trying to control his grin. “Yes. Yes, of course. Please,” she murmured.

  The fountain was not distant. It was near, in the Fissure of Kedi where she was to have been executed, and they were there in a moment. Spacebread tried not to appear let down.

  The blue fountain dribbled in a brackish stream from a slimy hole in the cave wall. The rock beneath it was bluish, the gritty water nearly clear as it gurgled into a thin pool.

  Spacebread and Gorsook exchanged a heavy look. Here was Klimmit’s last hope in the Home Worlds.

  They grimly went about their task. The old figlet held the coffer bearing his nephew while Spacebread silently opened the lid and turned on its thawing mechanism. It took only a moment. The instant Klimmit’s system began pumping the poison again, the clock began its deadly ticking.

  Trembling, Spacebread quickly dipped her paw into the stream and then held it to Klimmit’s small lips. Behind her she could hear the shaman and Niral both praying as the time ti
cked away. But the badge pinned to Klimmit’s chest to show the progress of the poison only grew darker with the passing of each second.

  Spacebread stopped it at thirty seconds remaining. The clatter of the box lid echoed in the chamber with finality.

  “It’s no use,” she whispered blankly, as though to Klimmit.

  * * *

  SHE ONLY REMEMBERED the next days dimly, through a fog of grief. More tears had won her the adoration of the Keece, although she remembered them not at all. A little clearer was the royal feast held in their honor and the long journey through the twisting, endless tunnels of the king’s domain to within sight of the Ranger post at the edge of the preserve. She recalled the small bribe that bought them a flight to Yestupah in a Ranger car, and during all this Gorsook’s growing exasperation with her. She could not bring herself to speak to him, to plan or plot further. And Niral only reminded her of a faith she could not share, one that might replace the shattered faith she had once held in herself.

  Quite suddenly she came to herself, sitting in the control pod of her ship. Gorsook was complaining to Niral in the rear of the ship.

  “Hargh! I’ve had enough! The cursed feline acts as if this calamity had befallen her instead of Klimmit. If you ask me, it’s her pride that’s hurt, that’s all. She’s been too used to winning. It’s time we were out of here and hunting down this Quan of yours. That’s the next step, now that there’s nothing to be done for poor Klimmit. Justice! If she doesn’t snap out of it soon, I’ll take my grenades and strike off by myself. I swear I will.”

  It was the word justice that did it. Gorsook had been talking about it for days, but it was as if Spacebread suddenly understood. She held her shoulders quietly for a moment, realizing that only she could bring herself to reality.

  Without making a noise, she strapped on her belt, sword, and pistol. But Gorsook’s keen ear had heard her stir, and he barred the way through the door.

  “Awake at last, eh? Where do you think you’re going?”

  She looked at him coldly. “I’m going into Yestupah. You’re right. There is nothing left to do but bring doom to those who have wronged us. That is what I’m going to do. I’ll find Geppu first and take care of his treachery. Then we’ll find Quan. You stay here and ready the ship for flight.”

  Gorsook put a hand on her shoulder to stay her, but the look in her eye stopped him. He watched silently as she left the terminal.

  “A Warrior does not think of revenge,” Niral quoted distantly.

  It was close to sunset as she worked her way through Yestupah’s narrow streets this time, the Whurdoon long past. Since she had left her filters on the ship, she had to wind her cape around her mouth against the stinging air, but she could hardly taste it for thinking of Geppu’s scrawny neck.

  The bazaar was closing down. Loose crowds of Yesturians milled about looking for bargains from the retiring merchants. But she did not see the small Geppu anywhere. Turning, she encountered the same merchant she had spoken to that first day during Whurdoon.

  “Where can I find Geppu?”

  “Old Geppu!” The creature’s face folded into a thousand surprised lines. “Amazing, he struck it rich and moved away! They say he has a villa in Vestudol, but I can’t believe it.” Then the merchant’s eyes focused on Spacebread’s white ears and alien eyes. “Why, aren’t you the white cat, the one who travels with the insect creature and the figlet? Here now, don’t stalk off like that. There was a fellow asking about you today, next to the bubble car booth. Paying for it, too.”

  Spacebread glanced in that direction, forgetting Geppu. She put one hand on her gun beneath her folded cape and walked through the thinning crowds. Unless the curious one was an ISP agent, he was one of Quan’s.

  She turned into the alley beside the booth and pulled her gun. The heavily robed Yesturian who sat in the shadows reading a porta-screen blinked in alarm.

  “You asked for me?” she hissed.

  Enlightenment dawned on the yellow face. “Yes, the offworld cat Geppu the old beggar told me of.

  But, please, I mean no harm, can we not do without the gun? I am but a peaceful merchant.” The Yesturian’s deep eyes twinkled as he opened his blue robe to show he was unarmed.

  Spacebread let her arm fall limp without holstering her pistol. “What do you want?”

  “Only to help. Geppu, the mad old half-Keece, told me of your plight the other day. How your friend from Kesterole was poisoned and what poison it was. I am greatly distressed to learn of your grief. The blue fountain has not … ?”

  Spacebread shook her head.

  “Ah. Its virtue only appears in certain cases. Most unfortunate. But I have what you seek.” The Yesturian lowered his voice, and there crept into it a most unmerchantlike tone. “There is but one force in the galaxy that can restore your friend. It is ancient and nearly forgotten, but it exists. None now know how to even summon it.”

  “Speak plainly,” she growled.

  “I speak of Osghan, and the Flame-that-is-not-a-Flame,” he said, his teeth flashing. “It exists, hidden perfectly near a greatly traveled space lane. It lies only two day’s flight from Yesturian. And I have a map.”

  Spacebread’s eyes narrowed, her hand gripped the gun. Something was wrong. There was something too neat about this.

  The Yesturian held out his porta-screen. “The tape is in this, on the private channel. I think of your grief and only ask you to pay me two hundred yestis. Two hundred yestis for the life of your friend.”

  For a long time Spacebread studied the Yesturian, trying to grasp what was troubling her. Finally she dug out the remaining Plembite certificates from her belt pouch and threw them at his feet. Carefully, gun still ready, she leaned over and took the porta-screen.

  “Ah. Plembite certificates. Most generous of you, madam. For this much you may take the entire screen, tapes and all. I assure you,”—and here the deeper and less Yesturian tone returned—”you will find what you deserve in fabled Osghan, where dwells the Flame of old. Healing for a thousand different ills. Enlightenment unbounded.”

  Spacebread glanced away from his glittering eyes to read the coordinates on the private channel. As Niral had said, the way to Osghan was through the Shadowmaze, an area Spacebread knew to be empty of planets. She looked up, but the Yesturian had vanished without a sound.

  She returned to the ship with mingled feelings, the weasel Geppu forgotten. It troubled her deeply that all avenues now pointed to the solution she had dismissed, the mythical Osghan. Her childhood memories were still colored with the stories her mother had told of the lost world and its forgotten truths. And like most memories of her early youth, she wanted to forget them. She did not want Osghan to be the solution for Klimmit, and that puzzled her.

  The Yesturian also bothered her. There was something about him she could not place, something about his robes and the sound of his voice. But it did not matter now. Nothing mattered.

  She climbed into the ship to find everything stowed neat as a pin, the equipment humming patiently.

  Gorsook crooked an eyebrow. “That didn’t take long.”

  Spacebread strapped herself in and closed the hatch. She inserted the porta-screen in the panel before her. “Read the private channel, Votal, and plot a quick course. No evasions this time. Notify the tower.”

  “Aye-aye,” Votal hummed, a metallic note of relief in his tone. “Good to have you back, milady.”

  Gorsook pounded the arm of his nest for attention. “Well! Where are we going?”

  Spacebread spoke idly, while reading gauges, “To Osghan of the Flame, where we will either find Klimmit’s cure or Korliss Quan waiting for us.”

  [12]

  Into the Shadowmaze

  “TRY AGAIN.” Spacebread spoke stonily to Votal. “Trivector Eight on wide sweep. Zero to forty scan.”

  “Aye-aye, milady.”

  Again the computer turned the ship’s multitude of scanners on the vast tangle of gas and dust ahead of them. Beams we
re discharged, mechanical eyes blinked to capture distant shapes echoing, crystal ears listened for deflected gravity probes. The hull hummed with sensors.

  Gorsook leaned over his Cosmos game screen. He glanced up disgustedly at Niral, who sat opposite him as opponent. “Again?” His gnarled green fist smashed on the game panel. “You win again! Bah! I’m sick of it.”

  Niral gestured apologetically.

  Gorsook turned to stare at Spacebread, who continued to check lists of figures. “And I’m sick too of this dawdling about in space,” he growled. “We’ve been out here for two days searching, combing that damn cloud, researching. You’ve got the bloody map right to the planet’s front door. Use it, for the Green’s sake!” He groaned anew at her silence. “This is as bad as the damn slave ship!”

  Spacebread’s eyes flashed. “Aye, and I’ve wished more than once I’d left you there.”

  “Hargh! A bitter choice between you and the harpies, milady.” But he caught Niral’s look of reproach and said again, “But I’m on for the cruise, until poor Klimmit is either spry or buried.”

  “Peace,” Niral interjected stoically, “is the lack of action.”

  “So is hell,” Spacebread commented with a glance in the Korliss’s direction. The priest had calmed much since that first night on Kiloo. He seemed to be finding something in his long meditations that indeed brought him peace. Spacebread too had found a new determination, born of hopelessness, but it brought her no peace.

  “Negative, milady,” Votal interrupted her thoughts. “Still I have no solid findings for that location. Only the black dust.”

  Spacebread frowned. It was the same as when she had mapped the region with Captain McPhreel in her youth. Twenty light-years long and wide, the huge boiling cloud showed no indication of having any solid matter inside. Many ships had tried to explore its lanes and winding tunnels, but none had returned. It was officially reported as one of the blank nebulae that floated throughout the galaxy, barren and obscuring. She dreaded entering it blindly to find the Yesturian’s coordinates, for the ship could easily become lost as so many others had done. She had hoped to locate the planet with some of the newer instruments first. Gorsook thought she was merely delaying. Perhaps he was right. Perhaps she still dreaded an encounter with a story from her past.